The Democratic National Convention wrapped up last week, but getting a clear picture of its financial benefits for Denver may take a while.

“The economic impact of this four-day event certainly has got to rank as one of the largest,” predicts Patricia Silverstein, an economist with Development Research Partners.

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper estimated the convention would generate $160 million in cash spending, a figure based on a study the city of Boston did after the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

But it could take another three to four months before an official reckoning is offered in Colorado.

“It is important to recognize both private and public costs and benefits, and carefully detail each,” said Jeff Romine, an economist with Denver’s Office of Economic Development, which will conduct an economic-impact study of the convention.

Some amounts are already known. Denver received $50 million in federal security funding, and donors provided $40.6 million for the event itself.

Boston reported another $20 million in outside spending on its convention.

What visitors spent won’t be known until tax receipts come in, but it is an important piece of the calculation.

Convention planners requested 17,200 hotel rooms to house 35,000 visitors. Assuming an average room rate of $175 a night across five nights, that represents $15 million in spending.

In Boston, visitors spent about $70 a day on food and other purchases, with private parties and group events averaging $41 a person a day. Spread across five days, that works out to about $19.4 million for Denver.

Boston’s convention generated about $100 million in direct spending, after deducting $39.5 million in offsetting costs.

The bulk of those costs came from the cancellation of two other events. Given the convention’s timing during an otherwise slow week, Denver avoided that.

Downtown hotel occupancy averages 39 percent on the Sunday the week before Labor Day, said Richard Scharf, president and chief executive of the Denver Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Downtown hotel occupancy came close to 100 percent during the convention, and rooms were booked across the metro area.

Shuttle vans and bus operators stayed busy, with business trickling down even to Golf Tournaments Inc. of Commerce City, which rented out its carts to shuttle delegates around.

Many downtown workers, however, hunkered down inside the office or stayed away, causing retailers removed from the fray along the 16th Street Mall or in LoDo to take a hit.

“People made plans to be elsewhere,” said Peter Meersman, president of the Colorado Restaurant Association.

Restaurants such as The Broker, Rocky Mountain Diner and Benny’s reported slower business during the week, while places closer to the action, such as Rialto Cafe and Cru Wine Bar, reported a robust week.

The closure of Auraria campus also took away from businesses that catered to the college crowd.

“We have such a regular group of customers, normally I’m at capacity,” said John Nicholas, a general manager at Noodles & Co. in LoDo.

Not knowing what to expect, some restaurants stocked up on food, extended hours or added staff, only to be disappointed.

How much they lost remains undetermined. Boston commuters cut their spending by about $12.4 million during the 2004 convention. Given that downtown Denver has about a third as many commuters as Boston, $4 million is a rough estimate.

Tourism-related businesses said they also didn’t see a bump in bookings that they hoped for from the convention.

“We haven’t seen any impact one way or the other. No increase or no decrease,” said Jeff Meeker, owner of Fair Winds Hot Air Balloons Flight in Boulder.

Carol Gottsegen of Timberline Adventures, which arranges hiking and biking trips, said conventioneers were a no- show, but she wasn’t ready to write off the event.

“Hopefully it will trigger some interest in us down the road — you often never know how people hear of you,” she said.

Some costs are hard to calculate, such as the time and fuel lost because of the closure of Interstate 25 on Thursday night for presidential nominee Barack Obama’s speech.

Government and business dollars spent to prepare for the convention could dampen spending in the months ahead. Likewise, corporate donations to fund the convention could mean leaner offerings for other events.

That said, there is also what economists call the multiplier effect.

For example, a foreign TV station contracts with a Littleton video producer who buys new equipment and books a weekend in Vail to make it up to her husband for working so many hours, and so on.

Every net dollar of spending from the Boston convention generated another 63 cents in additional spending, the Boston study estimated.

Using that multiplier, then Denver probably did much better than $160 million, more like $200 million to $230 million.

But the greatest economic benefit of the convention isn’t in the dollars visitors spent but the exposure they provided Denver, experts said.

“It has been a grand-slam home run for us in terms of getting a good global media coverage,” said Tom Clark, executive vice president of the Metro Denver Economic Development Corp.

Over time, that exposure could translate into new international flights or corporate relocations.

Walter Isenberg, CEO and president of Sage Hospitality Resources, described the mood in Denver during the week as well worth the costs in time and money.

“I have lived in Denver for almost 25 years, and I have never been more energized or seen the city more energized,” he said.

Romine lists another intangible benefit: thousands of volunteers coming together around a common goal — hosting one the biggest events in the city’s history.

“I’d refer to it as the ‘barn- raising’ effect,” he said.

Pulling off such a complicated and closely watched event so smoothly should move Denver higher up the list with meeting planners, meaning more conventions in the future, Scharf said.

Aldo Svaldi has worked at The Denver Post since 2000. His coverage areas have included residential real estate, economic development and the Colorado economy. He's also worked for Financial Times Energy, the Denver Business Journal and Arab News.

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